


Old Stuff: Surely to the Sea

by ravensluna



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-12
Updated: 2017-06-12
Packaged: 2018-11-13 04:42:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11177271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ravensluna/pseuds/ravensluna
Summary: Featuring mostly Kabby, with some background ships, like Minty and Harpoe and Bina and Rackson. Also featuring Dancer!Miller and Dancer!Harper (I’ve always got the feeling that Miller has some sort of background in classical dance?) and the delinquent fam being puppies. Also pretty much everyone has chronic pain and/or PTSD because let’s be honest, they probably do. I tried valiantly to make this fluff but it got a little angsty halfway through, with a happy ending, just like everything else I’ve ever written (which is like 3 things)





	Old Stuff: Surely to the Sea

**Author's Note:**

> When I was migrating old fics over from tumblr to AO3, I somehow missed this one! Written 5/4/16, set between seasons 2 and 3.

Abby sat on her customary stool in the common room, looking over some reports. She would have preferred to do it in the comfort and privacy of her own room, but she knew that it was important that she, as the Chancellor, be accessible and involved in everyday activities. It was an average Tuesday night in Arkadia. People sat at the bar, sipping drinks that Gina made with ease— she had really picked that skill up quickly, and was a more than adept bartender. To keep rowdiness down, alcohol was only served on Friday nights, and a few other special occasions, but Gina had no trouble learning all the non-alcoholic beverages in the recipe book she’d found in Mount Weather.

Others lounged around the room, reading, talking, playing games. Raven was tinkering with a new leg brace. Monty and Miller were sitting at the piano— it looked like Miller had some knowledge of how to play, and was trying to teach Monty.

Marcus walked into the common room, taking the seat next to Abby’s. “Everything’s quiet out there.”

Abby nodded absently, gazing out across the room. She noticed Harper walking quickly to the piano. She said something to Miller, and the two walked over to where Raven sat.

“Those three are up to something,” Abby remarked.

Miller ran back to the piano, grabbed Monty’s hand, and half dragged him to the little group. Abby smiled as she noticed Monty’s ears turn bright red. Much gesturing and whispering ensued between the four, and they disappeared off after Raven to the corner of the room where all the electrical controls were.

Abby was about to go investigate when she heard the unmistakable sound of country music twanging through the speakers. Miller and Harper ran to the middle of the room, and started— was that line dancing? Abby had heard the term before, but never actually seen it. She remembered that Harper’s mother had loved to dance— Abby didn’t know that she had ever seen the woman standing still— and always volunteered to help with the dances they held for the teenagers. She didn’t know much about Miller’s family, but he had a very good sense of rhythm and seemed to have a background in dance.

As the two stepped and kicked, attracting the attention of the whole room, Harper shouted, “Who’s ready to learn how to line dance?”

Monty started pulling people to their feet and positioning them into lines. Raven caught Abby’s eye across the room and gestured, in no uncertain terms, that Abby should join in. Abby shook her head— dancing was most definitely not one of her strong suits.

Marcus stood and offered her his hand. “Come on. Just one dance. You have to be involved with your people! This will be a good chance to rub shoulders with them. Possibly literally.”

Abby groaned, but stood up. Marcus took her elbow, and they made their way to the group, standing in the back row, at Abby’s insistence.

After the song finished, Harper started demonstrating the individual steps used in the dance, and the whole group, adults, teens, and children alike, stumbled around, bumping into each other as they attempted to learn the steps. Abby noticed Jackson standing with Raven, the two of them devising alterations to the steps that Raven couldn’t do. Once Harper and Miller deemed the group ready, Raven turned the music back on, and they started stomping, hopping, grapevining, and kicking.

Then came the twist. It turned out that, though Harper and Miller had danced the whole song facing in one direction so they could address the people in the room, after every repetition of the steps, they had to make a quarter turn. Which meant that two repetitions into the song, Abby and Kane were in the front, with the eyes of their people on them. They managed to get through the repetition without falling over, and they turned again. Now Marcus was behind Abby, and somehow, she found herself even more nervous. She mixed up her feet and started stepping in the wrong direction, even though she had the person in front of her to watch.

Finally, the song ended, and Abby tried to make her escape. Raven headed her off, of course. “Oh, no you don’t,” she said. “We’ve got a bunch more dances to learn!”

“As much fun as that sounds—”

“No arguing, Abby. This is a community event!”

Abby exhaled sharply. “Fine, but I’m the one who’s going to be patching up broken toes after I step on them.” She headed over to the bar and ordered a lemonade, and considered asking Gina to spike it with something a little stronger. She decided against it, though; alcohol would only make her dancing skills worse.

“All right, everybody, partner up!” Harper shouted, arm around Monroe. “We’re going to do the Virginia Reel next!” Abby turned and saw Marcus sitting in a chair near the wall. She marched over and said, “If I don’t get to get out of this, neither do you. Come on, you’re already my partner in everything else; might as well be my dancing partner too.”

The evening passed in a dizzying whirl of sound and heart-pounding exertion, not to mention sore toes. Abby decided it was time she headed back to her quarters. As she gathered her abandoned papers and reports, Marcus said, “Let me walk you to your room.”

Abby nodded, shuffling papers. As the two walked toward the door, the beginning chords of a familiar song made Abby hesitate. She turned back, surveying the room. Only a few people were still dancing. Gina and Bellamy swayed in the middle of the room, along with a few other people whose names Abby was too tired to remember.

Near one wall, a sprawling mass of mattresses and pillows had appeared. Monty, Jasper, Miller, Harper, and Monroe (and possibly some others: she couldn’t be sure, what with the tangle of limbs and hair) were lounging on it; heads on stomachs, feet in laps, like a pile of puppies. _What was going on there?_ Abby turned to ask Marcus, but felt her right leg buckle underneath her. With practiced ease, Marcus caught her and scooped her into his arms.

“I’m fine, Marcus. Put me down,” she said, in an attempt at assertiveness.

“You’re not fine, Abby. You’ve been on your feet too much again, and your leg still hasn’t fully healed.”

Abby still tried—and failed—to wriggle out of his grasp. “At least let me walk. You can help support me if that makes you feel better.”

Marcus shook his head, striding down the hallway. “What is it that you always tell Raven? Something along the lines of ‘pain is the body’s way of telling you that something is wrong, and even if you have chronic pain, you still have to listen to it.’ Right?”

Abby groaned. “I hate it when you use my words against me,” she muttered, tightening her arm around his shoulders. “Wait, what about your leg?” she asked. “That speech about pain goes for you, too.”

“The TonDC bombing was longer ago than Mount Weather, and I have a very good doctor who made me rest and treat my leg well,” he replied.

“It still hurts, though.” She’d noticed how his slight limp would get worse with cold or rainy weather, same as hers.

Marcus didn’t deny it, but kept walking.

“Marcus, stop.”

“I’m fine.”

“If you keep over-stressing your leg like this, it will end up worse, and you could be laid up for weeks, and then where will I be?”

Marcus stopped and set her gently on her feet, brushing hair out of her face. “Everyone loves you, Abby. I’m sure you could find someone to replace me.”

_There’s no one who can replace you!_ The words almost burst out of her. Instead, she put her palms on his chest and said lightly, “I don’t believe anyone in this camp is half as good at untying my shoes as you are.”

Marcus tried to hold back a smile. “All right, then, Doctor Chancellor Cinderella. At least let me help you walk.”

Abby leaned into the arm he slung around her and they continued down the corridor. She suddenly remembered the kids in the common room, and asked, “Do you know why the kids are sleeping in the common room?”

“I told them that they could sleep there.”

“Is there something wrong with their rooms?”

“They’re just too small. No one likes to sleep alone after that sort of ordeal. After I heard crying and screaming from all of their rooms in the middle of the night for the third night in a row, I suggested they drag their mattresses down there so they could all sleep together. There are still some nightmares, but they wake up to each other now instead of an empty room.”

Abby tipped her head up to look at Marcus’ face. It had become even gentler than usual, and sad. She didn’t know what to say, so she simply twined her fingers in the ones that rested lightly at her side. They walked in silence for a few moments, then a thought occurred to her. “How did you happen to hear the kids crying in the middle of the night? Your quarters are nowhere near theirs.”

Marcus hesitated. “They’re not the only ones who have trouble sleeping,” he said quietly.

“Who do you sleep with, then? I mean, sleep _with_ , not—”

“I don’t,” he answered. “I walk the halls instead. Bellamy and I slept on each other’s floors a handful of times, but then he and Gina got together, and besides, I hate the feeling of waking people up when I—” he stopped abruptly.

Abby pressed her head into his shoulder.

The two stopped in front of a door, and Marcus keyed in the security code. Abby sat down on the edge of her bed, and Marcus, seated in the large armchair by her bed, took her feet into his lap, untying the shoelaces and slipping the boots off. Abby was usually so stiff and sore by night that she had taken to sleeping in her shoes, because it was too painful to either bend over or pull her feet up to reach them. Marcus had stopped by late one night, figuring she was still awake, since he could see the crack of light under her door. He had stopped short at the sight of Abby, fully clothed, sprawled across her bed, halfway covered with blankets, booted feet poking out, because she was too stubborn to ask for help. Since then, he’d walked her to her room every night, helping her with her shoes, occasionally rubbing sore muscles, and making sure she actually went to bed.

Abby padded to her desk, touching a hand to his shoulder in thanks as she passed. As she organized the papers lying on her desk, Marcus realized that she was humming the song they had last heard in the common room.

He smiled to himself, picking up her music player from the shelf where it rested. There had been a surprising number of music players, speakers, and headphones in Mount Weather. They hadn’t taken anything off the bodies— that felt too irreverent— but they had taken useful things from the rooms. The music players had been handed out, with first pick going to the higher-ranking adults, but there were still enough for many of the kids to have them too. Monty had compiled all the music from all of them, so each player had all the genres and styles anyone could want.

Marcus selected the song he was looking for, and plugged the player into the speaker. Soft piano and guitar notes filled the air.

Abby, now sitting on her bed, looked up as Marcus approached her.

_Wise men say…_

Marcus held his hands out to Abby. “May I have this dance?” he asked.

_only fools rush in…_

“I–” she gestured at her leg. “I can’t.”

_but I can’t help…_

He took her hands in his and pulled her into the chair with him. She smiled slightly and settled sideways, with her left shoulder against the back of the chair, her legs draped across Marcus’ lap and dangling over the other arm of the chair.

_falling in love with you…_

Marcus slid his arm around Abby’s back, pulling her to himself. She rested her head on his right shoulder, and her right hand on the other.

_Shall I stay? Would it be a sin?_

Marcus rocked the chair in time to the music. He could feel the tension draining out of Abby as he gently rubbed the spot on her thigh where the drill had entered, tearing through muscle and bone. Pressure helped relieve nerve pain when nothing else helped, as he knew from experience. Sometimes when the pain in his leg spiked at night, he would wrap his belt tightly around where the pain radiated from. Unhealthy, perhaps, but at least it kept the pain somewhat at bay.

_Like a river flows surely to the sea, darling, so it goes; some things are meant to be…_

They remained motionless for a few minutes after the song ended. “Who was that singing?” Abby murmured sleepily. “It didn’t sound like the original guy.”

Marcus picked up the music player. “Ah, you’re right. This was sung by a Peter James.” He frowned at himself. Of course there were multiple versions of the same song on the music players. He should have checked— the one playing in the common area had been the original Elvis version.

“I like this version better than the original,” Abby said, her voice muffled by his shoulder. A few moments passed, then, “How does the second verse start?”

Marcus began to whisper into her hair, “Shall I stay—”

“Yes,” Abby interrupted. She looked up at him. “Please.” “Abby, I don't— you get too little sleep as it is. I don’t want to wake you up every time—” _Every time I have a nightmare about you being strapped to that table again._

“Do you think that somehow I’m the one person who’s escaped the flashbacks and nightmares?” Abby asked, her voice small.

“I—” his voice broke. “Why didn’t you say anything earlier?”

“I didn’t want to mess up _your_ sleep,” she responded ruefully. “I assumed you were fine. You weren’t ever on that table, so—”

“Someone I love was.” The words forced their way out unbidden, loudly. Marcus winced. He couldn’t believe he’d said that out loud.

Abby sat up and turned toward him, hesitantly taking his face in her hands. Touch came naturally to both of them, but this was different. She curled her fingers in the hair behind Marcus’ left ear, and ran her other thumb over his cheekbone. His left hand was still on her thigh, the right on her upper back. She closed her eyes and rested her forehead on his, her nose brushing the nose she knew so well.

“I love you too.”


End file.
